Virginia Tech Shooter Cho Seung-Hui, Like Major Nidal Malik Hasan at Ft. Hood, Used a Killing Tool Widely and Easily Available on the U.S. Civilian Market to Decimate Virginia Tech Campus -- The High-Capacity Semi-Automatic Pistol

Fairly Civil’s last post on the alleged plot by Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) leaders in El Salvador to assassinate an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent (“John Doe”) in Queens, New York, brought a skeptical response from some law enforcement quarters.  Here is the core of the post, which includes excerpts from an affidivait accompanying a request for an arrest warrant:

According to an affidavit filed in support of an arrest warrant, an MS-13 member specifically tasked to kill the ICE agent described the plot to federal agents. The gangsters were looking for an AK-47 or M-16 assault rifle to do the job.

The post also referred to a similar alleged MS-13 plot to kill LAPD gang detective Frank Flores, described in “The Plot to Whack a Cop,” which can be found here.

But retired Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department gang Sergeant Richard Valdemar questions in a private communication to the author whether these two incidents show a pattern, much less a shift, in MS-13’s abilities and intent regarding attacks on law enforcement officers:

Funny how in the many years (1993-2004) working with the FBI Task Force with numerous agents and agencies on the MS they would now fix on one LAPD Officer Flores in Los Angeles and one “John Doe” the ICE man in New York, and they can’t seem to find a AR-15 or AK-47 to do the dastardly deed. I think there have been a lot more effective cases and cops doing serious damage to the gang over the years than these two.

More likely …an informant, or couple of informants, got twisted in Los Angeles and New York, and gave up their own clique homeboys with information that they knew the cops would value (“they plan to kill a cop”). This kind of talk goes on a lot in the gang world, but the gang members don’t always go beyond the talking stage. And you, who has studied the trafficking in weapons associated with gangs (transnational gangs especially), can’t seriously buy the …”we can’t find an assault rifle to use” excuse.

At least one mid-level ICE official active in anti-gang operations in the Southwest agrees that one case does not make a pattern shift for MS-13 (the depredations and history of which are detailed in my book No Boundaries:  Transnational Latino Gangs and American Law Enforcement.)

Be that as it may, the cases raise an interesting question.  What kind of gangster or would-be terrorist can’t find the tools to do the job in the United States?

The gangsters in the ICE case allegedly were having problems finding their weapons of choice, i.e. a “fully automatic” M-16 or AK clone.  This echoed the case of would-be terrorists in Boston, posted here, who gave up a plot to shoot up shopping centers because they also could not obtain machine guns:

Fortunately, however, these jihadists thought they need machine guns, i.e., fully automatic weapons — hold the trigger down and the gun will fire until ammo is exhausted – to do the job. They gave up when they found out they could not obtain machine guns. However, knowledgeable experts understand that controlled fire from semiautomatic weapons — pull the trigger for each round — is at least as lethal and often more lethal than machine gun fire.

Thank g-d these extremist would-be terrorists were “weaponry pea brains.”

One might conclude that both of these cases simply reflect fortuitous ignorance on the part of would-be plotters.  Knowledge of firearms is not — as too many voices active in public fora apparently assume — easily received wisdom.  There is a stunning array of gun and ammunition types, with diverse capabilities, pros and cons, easily and widely available on the U.S. civilian gun market — not to mention the widespread criminal traffic in guns.  Any terrorist or gangster who complains about not being able to find the right tool for the job at hand is either a pea-brain or a poseur.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that!  But how long can we count on stupidity?

On the other hand, three successful mass shooters demonstrated that with firearms easily obtainable on the U.S. civilian market, a little bit of knowledge, premeditation, criminal intent, mental imbalance, and/or jihadist inspiration can be easily transformed into mass blood and carnage on … one wants to say “soft targets,” but how does one classify a U.S. Army fort?

Cho Seung-Hui committed suicide after killing 32 and wounding 25 in his infamous “Virginia Tech Massacre.” Washington Beltway sniper John Muhammad is scheduled to meet his maker after execution by lethal injection Tuesday, November 10. 1009, the U.S. Supreme Court having rejected his last-ditch appeal. Major Nidal Malik Hasan is alive at this writing, while government agencies try to figure out whether he was “merely” a jihadist gone nuts or a globally linked-in jihadist.

Major Hasan’s Choice for Killing Soldiers — The FN FiveseveN High Capacity Semiautomatic Pistol

Major Hasan's Pick for Soldier-Killing Machine -- FN's FiveseveN -- is Known in Mexico as the Matapolicia, or "Cop-Killer."

FN Herstal’s FiveseveN (cute name, eh?) semiautomatic pistol fires a small caliber round at very high velocity.  It is plain and simply a “vest-buster.”  The proprietary round-handgun combination is one of the most popular firearms smuggled by firearms traffickers into Mexico, where it is known as the matapolicia, or “cop killer.”

FN originally created the 5.7X28mm cartridge as the ammunition for the P-90 submachine gun.  The P-90 SMG was designed at the invitation of NATO and in response to military needs for a weapon to be used by “troops who needed both hands for other tasks, such as officers, NCOs and technical troops,” and that would be effective against the body armor that has become standard on the battlefield.

In the mid-1990s FNH set out to design a handgun to accompany the P90 SMG. This would not have been an issue if FN had stuck to its original profession that it would restrict the sale of its new armor-piercing ammunition and pistol.

The company clearly recognized the dangerous genie it was releasing. For example, a spokesman for the company told the Sunday Times in 1996 that the pistol was “too potent” for normal police duties and was designed for anti-terrorist and hostage rescue operations. The NRA’s American Rifleman claimed in 1999 that: “Law enforcement and military markets are the target groups of FN’s new FiveseveN pistol,” and told its readers, “Don’t expect to see this cartridge sold over the counter in the United States. In this incarnation, it is strictly a law enforcement or military round.” In 2000, American Handgunner magazine assured the public, “For reasons that will become obvious, neither the gun nor the ammunition will ever be sold to civilians or even to individual officers.”

High Capacity of the Fiveseven Adds to Its Mass Killing Power

In fact, however, the gun is being freely sold to civilians today, along with clearly problematic ammunition, through a variety of channels. What changed was precisely nothing.

Major Nidal Malik Hasan most likely gave some serious thought to his choice of weapons. With its high capacity magazine, extremely high velocity round, and cop-killing notoriety in Mexico, the FN FiveseveN was quite demonstrably an effective choice.

The reasons that American Handgunner referred to in 2000 became “obvious” last Thursday as Hasan efficiently murdered soldiers at Fort Hood in cold blood.

Beltway Snipers Chose Bushmaster AR -15 Clone

John Allen Muhammad was the senior member of the infamous Beltway sniper duo. His minor sidekick, Lee Boyd Malvo, was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the shootings, which took place over three weeks in October 2002 in Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. Ten people were killed and three others critically injured, as well as three other crime-related deaths attributed to the pair in Louisiana and Alabama.

2002 Washington Beltway Snipers Used a Bushmaster AR-15 Clone Like This Rifle

Muhammad, a veteran of the Persian Gulf war, picked a type of firearm with which he was undoubtedly familiar — a Bushmaster AR-15 type clone of the military’s M-16 assault rifle.  Bushmaster made its mark and fortune by cranking out AR-15 clones that beat the impossibly porous 1994 Semiautomatic Assault Weapons “Ban.”

AR-15 rifles of this type are as common in America as weed-whackers in spring at a suburban hardware store.  Here’s the point for slow-readers in this context:  Any gangster or would-be terrorist who can’t get his hands on one of these guns — whether you call it a “semiautomatic assault rifle” or a “thunder-stick” — or one of the the AK clones that have been dumped in the country latterly by Eastern European manufacturers and U.S. import-whores is simply in the wrong game.

Cho’s Choice — Ex-Lockmaker Gaston Glock’s High Capacity Model 19

Virginia Tech shooter Cho chose as his lead weapon the Glock Model 19, perhaps the archetype of the modern high-capacity semiautomatic pistol.  Easy to shoot, quick to reload, and demanding neither skill nor experience when shooting down unsuspecting innocents, the Glock Model 19 is also a favorite of gangsters and assorted thugs from Vancouver to the Yucatan.

Cho's Choice for Mass Murder -- Glock Model 19

Would-Be Shopping Mall Terrorist Apparently a Pea Brain When It Comes to Firearms

“Today we were unlucky, but remember we only have to be lucky once. You will have to be lucky always.”

Note left for British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher by Terrorist Group IRA After She Narrowly Avoided Injury in Brighton Hotel Bombing on October 12, 1984.

An affidavit filed by an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force agent in support of an application for search warrants in the Boston jihad terror case demonstrates once again how luck, incompetence, and poor training sometimes frustrate terrorists’ ideas.

Without taking an iota away from the investigative success in the case (read the full affidavit and other filings in the case to see how investigators were onto these characters like ink on print fairly early on), it is clear that the plotters could have wreaked horrific damage had they had a bit more knowledge about the potential lethality of firearms that are widely and easily available on the U.S. civilian market — even in Massachusetts.

An excerpt from the affidavit follows, setting out the would-be terrorists’ idea of attacking a shopping mall in the United States.  They even gave thought to how to deal with first responders.

Washington Beltway Snipers Used Semiautomatic Bushmaster AR-15 Rifle Like This One

Fortunately, however, these jihadists thought they need machine guns, i.e., fully automatic weapons — hold the trigger down and the gun will fire until ammo is exhausted –  to do the job.  They gave up when they found out they could not obtain machine guns.  However, knowledgeable experts understand that controlled fire from semiautomatic weapons — pull the trigger for each round — is at least as lethal and often more lethal than machine gun fire.

Thank g-d these extremist would-be terrorists were “weaponry pea brains.”

BACKGROUND ON THE THREAT OF SMALL ARMS TERROR ATTACKS

The private intelligence and analytical service Stratfor has written about the potential for small arms terror attacks in several postings.  These follow with links as background:

Observation on threat of armed attacks generally [note: this link may not work for non-subscribers.  Sorry!:

STRATFOR has long held that the United States and Europe are vulnerable to armed attacks against soft targets. In an open society, it is impossible to protect everything. Moreover, conducting attacks against soft targets such as hotels or malls can be done with ease, and can prove quite effective at creating carnage.

In fact, as we’ve previously pointed out,Cho Seung Hui killed more people with handguns in his attack at Virginia Tech than Jemaah Islamiyah was able to kill in Jakarta, Indonesia, in the August 2003 bombing of the Marriott Hotel and the September 2004 bombing of the Australian Embassy combined. Clearly, armed assaults pose a threat.

Observation on automatic versus semiautomatic weapons specifically from a Stratfor discussion of "lone wolf attacks":

Immaturity and lack of common sense also are significant hurdles for some would-be lone-wolf attackers. For instance, a person who attempts to buy an illicit fully automatic weapon when he could easily — and legally — obtain a less expensive semiautomatic version of the same weapon clearly is influenced by Hollywood and does not understand the effectiveness of controlled, sustained fire versus the spray-and-pray shooting he sees in the movies or on TV. As [Joseph Paul] Franklin and several mentally disturbed shooters have demonstrated, automatic weapons are not needed to inflict carnage.

EXCERPTS FROM AFFIDAVIT

Given the above context, the following excerpts from the affidavit pretty much speak for themselves and demonstrate how we got lucky this time.

Excerpts from Exhibit A, Affidavit of Heidi L. Williams in Support of Application for Search and Seizure Warrant, United District Court for the District of Massachusetts, Case No. 09-120-LTS

…

46. Because they believed, based on ABOUSAMRA’s experiences there, that Pakistan was not feasible, ABOUSAMRA, MEHANNA, and CW2 began exploring other options, including committing terrorist attacks in the United States.  For example, in 2003, ABOUSAMRA, MEHANNA and CW2 discussed the feasibility of shooting and killing a specific member of the executive branch of the United States government.  In another conversation around the same time, ABOUSAMRA and CW2 discussed targeting a second member of the executive branch of the U.S. government.

47.  While some of these plans involved no more than one or two conversations, at least one involved multiple conversations, discussions, and preparations.  For example, in the latter half of 2003, ABAOUSAMRA, MEHANNA and CW2 discussed a plan to obtain automatic weapons, go to a shopping mall, and randomly shoot people.  They were inspired by the success of the Washington, D.C. area snipers who were successful in terrorizing the public. [Footnote 15: In the fall of 2002, there were a series of sniper shootings in the area of Washington, D.C. (Maryland and Northern Virginia), that received a great deal of media attention and "terrorized" residents of those areas because of the apparent randomness of the attacks.  Ultimately, two men, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, were arrested and convicted of some of the shootings.]  ABOUSAMRA justified attacks on civilians, such as the September 11, 2001 attacks; ABOUSAMRA stated that civilians were not innocent because they paid taxes to support the government, and because they were Kufar (non-believers).

48.  The three men discussed the logistics of a mall attack, including the types of weapons needed, the number of people who would be involved, and how to coordinate the attack from different entrances.  They considered the emergency responses and the attack of those responders.

49.  In furtherance of the plan, CW2 traveled to new Hampshire to meet with Daniel Maldonado, in an attempt to acquire the necessary weapons.  According to CW2, Maldonado was a convert to Islam who, prior to his conversion, had contacts with gang members.  Therefore, CW2 believed that Maldonado would have access to the weapons they needed.  According to CW2, Maldonado told CW2 that he would be able to obtain handguns, but would be unable to obtain automatic weapons.  CW2 told Maldonado not to ask the reason he needed the weapons.  CW2 described Maldonado as someone with extreme beliefs, like ABOUSAMRA and MEHANNA.

50.  After returning to Massachusetts, CW2 told ABOUSAMRA and MEHANNA that Maldonado would only  be able to provide handguns.  Because of the logistical problems of executing the operations with just handguns, the plan was abandoned.

Virginia Tech Mass Shooter Cho Used Handguns

The following made it’s way to our little website by way of Rocktown Rebel.

AN INSULT TO ONE IS AN INJURY TO ALL

On occasion, this blog will be compelled to comment on events that occur outside of our corner of the “prison planet”, this is one of those occasions.

We have it on good knowledge that amongst the several hundred anarchists present at Pittsburgh this past weekend were at least two Virginians. Two individuals who we the authors have been personally acquainted with in the past. Neither of these individuals were natives of the Blue Ridge area, and thus had no reason to inject themselves with unbridled loyalty and commitment into the local political struggles of the region, sacrificing time, money, energy, and safety to help their friends and neighbors. Yet they did so anyway at every opportunity, acting out of genuine camaraderie and the unrelenting sway of their ethical compasses.

These two individuals, like the majority of the g-20 disruptors in Pittsburgh last weekend, are anarchists. They were among those who put their bodies on the front-lines in New Orleans after Katrina, when the public authorities “were too busy cleaning up the tourist areas of the French Quarter and protecting shops to help the poorer city dwellers”. They were among those who worked year after year anonymously scaffolding virtually every libertarian project in the Blue Ridge, and, unlike other local activists, never cashed in, never sought prominence, celebrity, the spotlight of book-signing tours and self-aggrandizing Internet communiques. And in Pittsburgh, they were among the brave souls bombarded with the technocracy’s chemical and sound weapons for standing up, for refusing to allow business-as-usual to operate.

Alex Jonze gonna knock you out!

That these comrades of ours, and the hundreds like them, would be subject to the most obscene of slanders by those media agents who proclaim with great vigor to speak on behalf of Obama’s “free market”, of the global world order; this is of utterly no surprise. When  self-appointed activist leaders, such as Alex Jones, stab in the backs the working-class grunts who make possible the mass-movements they parasitize off of,  out of no motivation other than sheer cynicism and opportunism, to create a publicity stunt to generate more interest in their bankrupt channels of official dissent, when this happens the waters become murkier. Ambiguity and uncertainty are exploited, manipulated, and above all expanded and proliferated. The wells of communication are poisoned. And for what?

We will not degrade ourselves, stooping down to the level of dogs, by pedantically correcting every egregious factual error in the article entitled “Provocateur Cops Caught Disguised As Anarchists At G20″ on Alex Jones’ “Prison Planet” website. We leave this to the myriad other anarchist bloggers who have already jumped at the opportunity to volunteer with such an endeavor.

This is the same news service, after all, that, forgoing an opportunity for rational analysis of the situation, reported that Virginia Tech shooter Cho Seung-Hui was a “Mind Controlled Assassin“  on the flimsiest of evidence; the fact that Mr.  Seung-Hui, like many of his fellow-workers, was on anti-depressant pharmaceutical drugs, and a photograph of an East-Asian man, who may or may not be Mr. Seung-Hui, posing in marine fatigues, available for a reasonable price at any military surplus store.

This is where we, as rednecks, as Virginia patriots, as workers of the world, come from when we denounce Alex Jones. Cho Seung-Hui, fellow Virginian, fellow worker, was not a “mind controlled assassin”, but a sad, lonely individual who was driven to senseless and malicious violence by a lifetime of sexual abuse, racial harassment, institutionalized marginalization,  and social isolation. His victims, all fellow Virginians, all fellow workers, were not martyred by a grand sinister conspiracy, but by the senseless and chaotic cluster-fuck known as life under capitalism. In the face of a calamity that rippled through our communities like a shock-wave, Jones’ cronies rushed to the presses with the most sensationalistic lie their imaginations could innovate, with the sole purpose of capitalizing off of our suffering.

This alone is enough to denounce Alex Jones, to discredit him entirely as a source of factual journalism. Yet it’s far from the extent of Jones & co.’s crimes:

• In the face of courageous proletarian mass-uprisings in ‘05, Jones penned a piece entitled French Riots: Plan Engineered by Globalists, a racist tirade which claimed that “the mainly Algerian Muslims causing the chaos hate the country that has afforded them a greater living standard than their birthplace ever could”, and that “the melting pot of multiculturalism does not work, it has never worked and it was never intended to work. The Algerians in France do not want to be part of the Western fabric because they fundamentally hate it to its very core. This is not helped by promotion of decadent and hedonistic lifestyles pumped out from every cultural and media orifice.”
• Time after time, Alex Jones has pushed the white nationalist line on U.S.-Mexican immigration, siding with the Minutemen over anti-fascists, featuring Lou Dobbs and other “MSM” anti-immigrant gate-keepers on his website, claiming that “the elite are using the enraged Mexican mobs as a weapon of conquest to slit America’s throat and sacrifice its sovereignty on the altar of globalism” as well as implement a “blueprint for race-based genocide directed against blacks and whites in America” in order to turn the U.S. into “a third world cesspit”, falsely claiming in order to generate white supremacist angst and terror that the sell-outs and bureaucrats at La Raza are “reconquista” radicals, updating his website with headlines such as “Illegals targeted South Carolina sheriff as gang-initiation“, and so on. (Rest assured, we at Rocktown Rebel are playing the world’s smallest violin for the South Carolina sheriff)
• Alex Jones charges $1500 a month for advertising on his various websites. Among his past clientele include “Scriptures for America”, an organization headed by notorious “Christian Identity” pastor Pete Peters,  who once asked, rhetorically: “Is there a Jewish conspiracy against America? Do Jews control America’s media? Do Jews have a death grip on America’s government? [...] Do Jews prevent a free press in America? Are Jews against freedom in America? Do Jews want total people control? Are Jews liars? Do Jews want to put America under tyranny? Must Jews leave America if America is to survive?” Book titles available on the  Scriptures for America online catalog include Martin Luther King, Jr.: His Dream, Our Nightmare, Death Penalty for Homosexuals is Prescribed in the Bible, Interracial Marriage – Right or Wrong?, My Personal Experience with Jewish Power, and Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel’s The Six Million Holocaust.
• On one episode of his radio show, a caller stated “It it is incorrect to call a modern day Jew an Israelite. They are not Israelites, they are ‘Israe-Lies’. [...] The ‘true Israel’ is ‘ the Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, Germanic and kindred people, commonly called the white race, which has been demonized.” Alex concurred, explaining that it’s “true that about 80-85[%] [...]  of Jewish people are Khazarian”, and that “80% of Jews are a mix of Germanic and Asian, whereas your mainline Semitic Arabs are a mix of Negro, Caucasian, and Asian”, going on to explain that ” you have the Caucasoids, the Negroids, the Asians, and those are your three major groups”.
• Other featured on Jones’ various websites include “6-Year-Old Boy Raised By Homosexuals Wants to Kill Himself”, “Playboy and the (Homo) Sexual Revolution”, and “Unmentionable Vice [referring to homosexuality] Goes Mainstream”.
• Jones has professional relationships with Holocaust denier Mike “whatreallyhappened.com” Rivero and anti-Semitic fascist pastor Texe Marrs
• Jones is able to afford to live in an affluent Austin suburb due to his sale of overpriced Infowars and Prison Planet DVDs, T-shirts, baseball caps, bracelets, and other mass-produced merchandise. (As the blog we stole this from put it, “there’s a war on…for your wallet!”)
• Jones co-operated with an FBI subpoena for a list of InfoWars readers’ IP addresses after a Roanoke man used his site to threaten police officers. Jones explained that he’s “not [...] happily handing over peoples’ IP addresses” but that threatening law enforcement “isn’t a joke”.

All this creates a context for Jones & co.’s latest deception. That context is psychological warfare against the libertarian left by parasitic right-wing third positionists who advocate anti-Semitism, racialist nationalism, schizophrenic masonic/Illuminati conspiracy theories, anti-feminism, and totalitarian-minded moral crusades, whose leaders sell this madness and disinformation to live comfortably as others starve. Far too long has this incessant milieu slandered us from afar, while infiltrating us and recruiting our ranks from within. Too much amnesty has been given within our camp to Jones and his accomplices,  as if they were some lesser force of fascism in comparison to the Identity militias, the Klan, the skinheads, the Minutemen. At the forefront of our vision now stands this unavoidable fact: the only difference between Jones & co. and these other forces of fascism is a more pronounced aura of tact and sophistication on the part of the former.

Therefore

• We must retaliate against Alex Jones & co. by sapping their life-force :  the deceived and misguided masses who stand behind them. We must all the same sneaky tricks – infiltration, tact, subterfuge – in winning their ranks over as has been done to us by them in the recent past.
• We must retaliate against Alex Jones & co. by doing anything within our capabilities of preventing their lies and slander from being further propagated.
• We must retaliate against Alex Jones & co. by no longer allowing them to politically operate in our local communities on any level. (This point is of especial relevance to our Texan comrades)
• Finally, we must never allow the capitalist journalists and activist-bureaucrat leaders, such as those present during the confrontation in Pittsburgh, (Jones, Shehan, the Daily Show, et. al) to walk amongst our ranks without ridicule and vocal denunciation.

FROM WND

Dumbledore’s ’social change’ agenda teaches foreign policy ‘friendship’

By Bob Unruh

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No dia 16 de abril de 2007, Cho Seung-hui, 23 anos, matou 32 pessoas e deixando mais quinze feridas na Universidade Estadual da Virgínia, em Blacksburg. Suicidou-se.

O possível motivo era o bullying enfrentado pelo estudante por seus colegas.

Aluno do último ano de letras, com especialização em inglês, Cho vivia na própria universidade.

“Havia alguma preocupação em relação a ele”, disse a diretora do Departamento de Literatura Inglesa da Virginia Tech, que não conhecia Cho pessoalmente.
“Às vezes, em redação criativa, as pessoas revelam coisas, e você nunca sabe se é apenas criação ou se elas estão descrevendo coisas, se elas estão imaginando coisas ou quão reais elas podem ser. Mas nós estamos todos alertados a não ignorar coisas como essas.”

Segundo a polícia, o estudante tinha o Greencard, que lhe permitia trabalhar nos Estados Unidos. Esse documento permitiu também que Cho comprasse sem dificuldades as armas que usou no massacre.

Uma pistola usada nos ataques havia sido comprada cinco semanas antes, por US$ 571 (R$ 1.163). O recibo da compra foi deixado por Cho em sua mochila.

Pelas leis da Virgínia, para comprar uma arma, basta ter mais de 18 anos, passar incólume por um teste de antecedentes criminais e ser um cidadão americano.

Realistically, I had to expect that this would be a weird week.

When I was little, writing stories came naturally to me. As I grew up, writing stories became essential to how I saw myself. Now that I’m in college, writing stories seems to me something of a luxury…but a luxury I would make central to my adult existence if I only felt like I really had a choice. And as grateful as I am for the opportunities I have as an American student of higher education, let’s face it — the choice to sit around and try your luck as a writer is not really a choice at all. Some days it seems like a condemnation.

But on the days when I can crawl out of bed and walk to Shanks Hall, Lucinda Roy’s Creative Writing class provides some of the rare moments where I feel that writing could be a satisfying investment. To be clear, I’m not trying to depict Professor Roy as this larger-than-life figure who forcibly shakes me from the humdrum of the college routine. I sort of feel that to do that would actually reduce her to a gaudy stereotype. You don’t have to be Robin Williams in Dead Poet’s Society to impact a student’s life. At this point, still enrolled in the course and unsure if I’m even doing my best in it, I can’t say what type of impact she will have on my academic career or on the embers of my writing aspirations…but she’ll certainly leave a mark that goes a little deeper than most of the teachers I’ve had at Tech. And that’s simply by being herself, critiquing my work and having a sense of humor.

She’s a really down to Earth person, despite her classy and intellectual airs. It’s actually really easy to forget how influential she is in the English department — and the fact that she’s an award-winning novelist. She’s one of those professors you’d figure Tech would brag about when you look at her resume. But when she teaches you in class, she’s this charming person who is insistent on the best for you.

Which is why it’s really weird to see her on CBS News talking about Cho Seung-Hui.

At the beginning of the semester, she warned my class that she would be publishing a book on the events of April 16 and her interactions with Cho. She said if any of us were uncomfortable with it that she understood and she would facilitate a transfer to another professor. To my knowledge, no one dropped the course. I certainly wouldn’t leave a course because my professor used her available platforms to tell her story. Considering some of my entries on this blog, that would be pretty hypocritical of me.

I suppose I heard from a co-worker at The Collegiate Times that the book was being published this month. But it was only this morning, three days before the second anniversary of the shootings that I thought of Googling her and checking out the reaction. And there she was, my Creative Writing teacher talking to Katie Couric and Matt Lauer about what she saw in Cho and what she believed went wrong. (Videos at the end.)

…So that’s about one degree of separation between me and two prominent journalists. It’s a similar kind of weird proximity to the mainstream media that I felt on the 16th when I saw my friends on the front page of internet news sites…It’s not exciting or cool, it’s…Well, the fact that she’s being interviewed because some guy from the same suburbs I grew up in killed 32 people including two people I knew…Yeah, there’s no excitement derived from that.

As always, she handled herself with grace. The questions from the reporters, including Couric and Lauer, were tiring and painfully mechanical. References are made to the e-mail exchange between her and Cho which I first read on the CT’s website. It’s eerie. It also, sadly, answers no questions.

Professor Roy seems to have gotten as much insight into Cho’s character as he would allow — that is, not very much. Whenever I hear her talk about what she thought was wrong, I get the distinct impression that she doesn’t quite know herself. He displayed an inappropriate tone and attitude toward professors. He had odd choices in indoor accessories. He was stunted in his ability to communicate anything but a sense of vague hostility toward the establishment. But he was still a blip in a large classroom. And she last saw him three and a half years ago. And yet, Professor Roy is one of the few people who can and does try to shed any light on the unfathomable thoughts and motivations of Cho Seung-Hui.

That tells me that, as we typically say about people who commit senseless acts of violence, there’s a good chunk that we’ll never know.

Why am I writing about this? I don’t know — to feel relevant. This is my professor on primetime news, someone who I speak to every week, someone who has directly affected some of my personal writing. And I’m moonlighting as a no-bullshit, on-the-ground, through-my-eyes web journalist. I suppose I’m something of a primary source and I owe it to the Blogosphere (ugh, that word).

No, but really, I owe it to myself.

It’s just strange. I need to express that somehow, through whatever avenues I have to express it. This whole week is going to get stranger. But come finals times, those feelings will recede again and it’ll almost be like it never happened. Almost.

I think Professor Roy was brave to speak out. And I hope this doesn’t affect her adversely in any way. She’s a gifted teacher and a fun person to talk to. It is my sincere wish that she ultimately be recognized for something much happier than an association with Cho Seung-Hui.

Her book is called No Right to Remain Silent. I’m sure I’ll pick it up and see what she had to say on the matter. When I’m ready.

Interview with Katie Couric:

Longer interview for CBS:

And here’s a link to the interview with Matt Lauer. He really got on my nerves.

A reflective piece on April 16th this Thursday, if I can manage it.

I’ve decided to pick up an old project that I’d left gathering dust in my miscellaneous documents folder for about two years now.  It was a memoir project that I put together for a combo-final for two of my classes at the time (Spring semester, 2007) and was the most fun I’d ever had putting together a final project in all of my scholastic career.  I’m going to polish each episode, add and subtract from each and hope that you, the readers, will find the experience enjoyable.  Hopefully you guys comment on each episode, help me expand and contract at necessary points and give me a focus and introduce ideas for new chapters when I’ve run out of the material that I’ve already written.  This’ll be fun, at least for me.  There’s nothing more fun than putting intimate details of my life on the interweb as general knowledge!  Okay, let’s get into it.

I dedicate this to my parents and my brother (who are as much a part of this assignment as I am), to the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre pierced because of misdirected hatred, to Professors Tongson and Yamashita, whose classes I enjoyed the most the whole of my collegiate career and have learned so much from, and to my friends, y’all know who you are (circa 2007)

I guess this is where I write about what this piece is all about, what my influences are and what it is, exactly, that I hope to accomplish in my attempt at writing it.  I wonder if real authors write this before or after the actual writing of their book/novel/poem etc.  To be brutally honest, I’m only attempting this because I have two classes in my last semester at the University of Southern California (ENGL-478 and AMST-449) that have given me the leeway to creatively develop my own final project, and I’m trying to kill two birds with one stone.  Both projects have to have a textual equivalent of at least ten pages, so we’ll see how long this thing ends up.  ENGL-478 is an English class that centers around the spatial construction known as the suburb, something I feel I have experienced intimately all of my life, and AMST-449 is a class on Asian-American literature based out of the Los Angeles area, something that I feel I have greatly expanded my knowledge in after having taken that class and now have the authority to develop my own response to.

I’ve lived in a realm of stereotypes all of my life.  My ethnic forwardness that just comes from the look I’ve inherited from my Taiwanese immigrant parents has cordoned me off into an imaginary corner sometimes, but its something that I’ve always dealt with and have easily come to terms with.  Life isn’t fair for the minority (model or not), regardless of whatever country or enclave you choose to live in.  With the recent massacre of thirty-two people at Virginia Tech on April 16th, 2007 a mere two days in the past, I can only wonder what the cultural backlash for such a tragic act will be.  Cho Seung-Hui, from all “the facts” that have arisen so far in the news, was a very disturbed young man.  The scary thing is that this malicious killer, on first glance, isn’t all that different from me.  A loner at times, male, Asian-American (he came to America when he was still young and impressionable, so I consider him to be at least from the 1.5 generation – I mean, most FOB immigrants here in America for overseas studies don’t end up studying English), twenty-something, and an English major.  So am I being profiled now?  Am I an unstable, emotional wreck mere moments away from lashing out in an uncontrollable rage against all that is rich, White and representative of all that had unfairly limited my life in America thus far?  I know I’m not, but as a person who has lived with the weight of stereotypes on me my entire life, I can only wonder what baggage this ordeal will add to my identity as an Asian American male.

This is my attempt to reconcile my experiences growing up as an Asian American in suburbia with that of others like me out there.  I know there are others like me out there, but from what I’ve read so far, no literature has been written from this perspective.  Maybe this is just the beginning of a longer work, but I feel there is a place for this writing, and I also feel that in the process of writing this, I’ll find my own niche in this vast and immeasurable patchwork known as literature, and be able to show the world that not all twenty-something, Asian-American, male English majors are dark, sadistic and impulsive in their demeanor and writing (like Cho Seung-Hui), but there is reason to hope and learn from the inequality of living in America for the sake of others like us, stuck in the same position, feeling like there is nowhere to turn – as idealistic as that sounds.

.

Un día de abril del pasado 2007, nuestro amigo Cho entró en su universidad, la Virginia Tech, y provocó la matanza estudiantil más terrible de los últimos años.

Un año de distancia y el rigor de la BBC subrayaban el interés del documental (Masacre en Virginia Tech), que emitió el 60 minuts (Canal 33, martes, 22:05)

.

En los vídeos y las fotografías que nuestro amigo Cho mandó a la NBC, hablaba como si lo suyo fuera un acto de venganza. Por los años de vejaciones y humillaciones que he padecido, incluso decía. En el documental, las entrevistas a compañeros de habitación y de clase, desmentían estas hipótesis (aunque esto nunca es del todo fiable, pues el sufrimiento que uno padece es el que siente dentro, y el que siente no tiene porque ser el que los demás ven, o perciben, que sufre).

.

Lo que si hace el documental, con mucho tacto, es reseguir una biografía de nuestro amigo Cho. Su timidez extrema, el aislamiento que eso le producía, el diagnostico de “mutismo selectivo”, los personajes que ideó para intentar sobrevivir, sus escarceos en el mundo literario, una débil iluminación a su mundo interpretando, por psicólogos infantiles y expertos criminólogos, sus obras y de sus texto,…

.

La interpretación de sus obras, visto lo que ocurrió después, es algo bastante peligroso. Si esos expertos interpretasen la obra de, que se yo, Stephen King… ¿qué conclusión sacarían?

.

.

Nuestro amigo Cho:

Cho mezclaba una visión negativa de sí, de su obra literaria; una permanente inseguridad y a la vez, un egocentrismo y una arrogancia bastante insufrible… algo que no tiene nada de especial. Consultad algunas biografías de escritores y/o directores de cine, y encontrareis esta misma dualidad.

Con la expresión “nuestro amigo Cho” quiero decir que personas como Cho no son unos monstruos extraños (o de serlo, también lo somos nosotros). Es evidente que rebasan un punto de no retorno, y todo ese odio (tan natural como humano) explota por doquier.

.

El documental

..

.

]]> http://socialcapital.wordpress.com/2008/08/08/memorials-and-the-healing-of-the-spirit/ Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:00:38 +0000 socialcapital http://socialcapital.wordpress.com/2008/08/08/memorials-and-the-healing-of-the-spirit/

I was at New England Yearly Meeting over the weekend.

While there, I had my first chance to see the AFSC’s Eyes Wide Open exhibit, or a piece of it. They have a collection of military boots of the soldiers killed in Iraq, in addition to a memorial to the Iraqi civilian casualties. The number of boots has become large enough that the boots no longer travel as an exhibit together but now appear in regional form, and I saw the boots from the New England soldiers.

Each boot listed the soldier’s name, military rank, age, hometown and state. Some of the boots had notes written by the families, or an American flag stuck in a boot. One had a teddy bear. Another, a member of an Eastern religion, had a little shrine to the soldier’s god. Some boots were pristine. Others muddied and scarred. It was a somber reminder of the horrible costs of a war that we never had to wage that has disproportionately taken the lives of “volunteers” with fewer other economic options. I took in the boots in prayerful silence and the shame for national bellicosity that has condemned so many innocent Americans and Iraqis to die.

One of the NEYM participants spoke later in a meeting for worship of a recent visit to Virginia Tech (Viriginia Polytechnic Institute), site of the horrible massacre in April 2007 by a student, Seung-Hui Cho, who took 32 lives and wounded many others before taking his own. The campus in Blacksburg, VA, sits close to a quarry and many of the buildings are made with hokum stone from that quarry.

The speaker told how she learned that in the days following the Va. Tech tragedy, mysteriously overnight a makeshift memorial appeared with 32 hokum stones in a semi-circle, with a ribbon for the name of each person who died in the shooting spree. Then a few days later, a 33rd hokum stone appeared with a ribbon for the perpetrator, Cho Seung Hui. There ensued some debate among the Va. Tech community about whether the perpetrator should have a stone at the memorial or not. Some argued that the stones should be only for innocent victims and ultimately the 33rd stone was taken away. The speaker and others discussed the Quaker view that there is that of God in every person, Cho included, and how this could have been a time for still deeper healing. Another wondered where the mother or father of Cho can now go to mourn for the loss of her son and the tragedy.

Va Tech makeshift memorial (on right of photo)

I recalled Randy Pausch’s view that everyone has their good side, but it takes longer to emerge in some people than others. (Incidentally, Randy didn’t make much of his religion but was a Unitarian Universalist who came to this faith as a member of the First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh; I don’t know, for example, whether he believed in God.) In any event, the NEYM experience and the Va. Tech memorial debate evoked a narrative that played out among comments in this blog surrounding Randy Pausch. De Selby (whom I have never met) was very critical of Randy Pausch in blog comments, claiming that Randy was not sick and was using his claim of pancreatic cancer to sell millions of books. At some point I cut off debate between De Selby and supporters of Randy since it no longer seemed constructive. De Selby asked why I was no longer posting his rants; I said I disagreed with his views, knew Randy and that Randy was a decent person, but that he was entitled to his anger and his views. I urged De Selby to channel his energy into leading his life in way that he thought was inspirational if he felt Randy wasn’t. There were many nasty posts of blog readers against De Selby which I chose not to post since it seemed unconstructive. Then Randy died. Some readers posted nasty blog comments mocking De Selby for his earlier views that Randy’s cancer was a fraud. I didn’t post those but I did post the blog comments of a few who gently asked whether De Selby wished to comment now and another who said alas De Selby’s claims of a fraud apparently had not been true. De Selby took this opening to apologize for his comments and noted that they came from having had family members who died from cancer who appeared far sicker than Randy. He thought Randy (who looked in good health) was just using cancer to get publicity. A circle of support opened around De Selby after his admission of wrong to show how he was proving Randy’s point that people do show their good side if you wait long enough. I don’t know what De Selby will go on to do, but I hope it will be worthy of Randy. You can read the original post here and the comments here.

These incidents made me reflect on when death and memorials are healing and when they are embittering. I’m reminded of the wise words of a cousin who said that she wanted the death of a loved one to be a point of growth, not the beginning of a drawing in, a calcifying depression and a disengagement from others.

Faith is the bird that that feels the light and sings

When the dawn is still dark.

– Rabindranath Tagore

In the aftermath of the shooting at Northern Illinois University in February of this year, Americans struggled to understand how Steven Kazmierczak could have perpetrated such a terrible tragedy. National media outlets quoted close friends of Kazmierczak who described him as “probably the nicest, most caring person ever.” His professors said he was “a nice kid” and “extremely respectful.” NIU Police Chief Donald Grady said that law enforcement had “no indications at all this would be the type of person that would engage in such activity … There were no red flags.”

They were wrong.

A recent article in Esquire, published more than five months after the shooting, paints a far different picture. Unlike the sweet, award-winning graduate student that we heard about in February, Esquire writer David Vann tells the story of a troubled, volatile individual who was clearly a threat to himself and those around him.

Read more: The Same Old Story

Today is the first anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre. I wrote a poem on the day that Cho Seung-Hui Went on a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech. While the poem is not meant to minimize the evil of Cho Seung-Hui’s attack on students and teachers, it does express a certain amount of pity for Cho and the inarticulate and mad world he lived in.

While we must honor the victims of Cho’s madness today, we must also continue to work toward the elimination of mental illness. Unfortunately, Cho’s actions have caused a negative reaction toward mentally ill college students. Some students are already working hard to hide their mental illness, refusing to go for counseling or going off campus for counseling to avoid the stigma and to avoid the committees that have been set up to keep track of mentally ill students.

By forcing the mentally ill “underground,” we are not helping them; and I am not sure we are really making our campuses any safer.

Click here to read my poem about Cho Seung-Hui.

Here’s how.

A worthless piece of shit called Rachel Sullivan left a message on Bill Lee’s anti white, hateful blog. Here is the link –  sailerfraud.blogspot.com/2006/07/hate-crimes.html

“OMG, I love you Bill Lee. I cannot stand Sailer and all of the neo-eugenics crowd. Have you seen gene expression (the blog)?”

The quote is from Rachel. The article appeared July 15, 2006. The article is called Hate Crimes. Regular readers of this blog and Bill Lee’s blog have witnessed some of the most hateful racism directed at white people. So this is what we are going to do. We are going to punish Rachel for being a fan of Bill Lee and promoting his blog (her website is Rachel’s Tavern, she links to Bill Lee’s website and they both work together on another blog) Rachel Sullivan is an assistant sociology professor at Long Island University. I’m not going to list her email because emailing her will solve nothing. Whining to her that she is wrong for liking a disgusting racist like Bill Lee will solve nothing. Instead, lets email her boss? Eh? Sound like a good idea? I mean, it is not like she has tenure or anything. She is a mere assistant professor.  

Here is the contact info for the chair of the socilogy department.

Dr. Eric Lichten
Chair, Department of Sociology & Anthropology
C.W. Post Campus
Long Island University
720 Northern Boulevard
Brookville, NY 11548-1300  

(516) 299-2404
Eric.Lichten@liu.edu

Here is the contact info for the President of Long Island University, David J. Steinberg.

Office of the President
Long Island University
University Center
700 Northern Blvd.
Brookville, NY 11548-1327
(516) 299-2501
(516) 299-2590 fax
President@liu.edu

I am having trouble finding the guys you contact to complain about a professor. The school makes it clear how it wants its students to behave, but says nothing about student rights. It must be on their website somewhere–hidden, I’m sure.

Also, you can rate Rachel Sullivan at Ratemyprofessor.com

I bet that all it would take– all it would take– is for just three people to send emails to the two men listed above and Rachel will have to find work somewhere else. That’s it. So, what should you tell them? How about this.

Bill Lee called a white man an albino savage. Article Demented Illinois Murderer sailerfraud.blogspot.com/2008_02_01_archive.html

The link above will also prove that Bill Lee made this racist comment — “Yes, the white male did it again.” The article is about the man who went on a rampage at NUI.

Anohter racist comment- “Diane Morre- a victim of the white man’s thirst for violence and blood.” The article is called “Who’s more dangerous, the murderers or the deniers” link    sailerfraud.blogspot.com/2007_12_01_archive.html

Another anti white, hateful quote from Bill Lee (wordpress is getting buggy, that is why the text is green)

“Post Thanksgiving Family Model”

sailerfraud.blogspot.com/2007/11/post-thanksgiving-model-family.html

“Sadly, it would be better the sons were dead because with their violent and hateful upbringing from their father, they would have commited a far more heinous murder-suicide plot.”

This quote should turn all decent respectable people against Bill Lee. Bill was commenting on a white father who killed his kids. Bill is truly a disgusting, revolting little yellow shit, and everyone who links to him or promotes him will learn, just as Rachel will soon learn, that hate does not pay.

Finally, when you list all of Bill lee’s quotes, and link to them, in your email, make sure to include Rachel’s quote about how she looooooooves the wimpy, racist, hateful, anti human race Bill Lee. It might not hurt to point out that for 4 years Bill has stalked Steve Sailer, even trying to get a picture of his wife.

Bill Lee clearly needs professional help. Left wingers who have linked to his blog have proven that they will actually take advantage of a sick man to spread their ideas. Instead of telling Bill that he is sick and should get help, they say “Oh, great blog.” Max Blumenthal is one of them. They just reinforce Bill Lee’s unhealthy obsession and his creepy, stalking behavior. I predict that soon Bill Lee will erupt in hateful violence, killing anyone in his path.

Bill Lee, there is still time. Put the gun down. The weather is changing. Go outside and get some fresh air, get off the internet, and dammit, son, get a LIFE. No wonder you are depressed and do not care about wasting your life on your stupid blog. You simply do not have a life.

As for you, Rachel, welcome to hell.

P.S. Readers, don’t forget. Three emails….. just three…..

*NOTE* On retrospect, I don’t really treat Seng Henk like shit.

This day is ultimately the most amazing, most super duper shocking one, and it’s only been what? 3 months?

1. OK, I know there’s going to be some flak for me mentioning this, BUT…

I KISSED GIA.

Yes, my lips touched his skin. During PE, during Captain’s Ball, his arm shot up to intercept the ball. But as Kevyna and Shah can attest, Gia is overenthusiastic about EVERYTHING to the point of being annoying and so he slapped his arm forward.

That resulted IN MY LIPS TOUCHING HIS FUCKING ARM. (Louis and Troy, you guys know, you were there.)

Like, oh my effing goodness can?! My lips have never touched something so foul and unbelievably disgusting before.

I actually immediately declared myself unfit to play and went to wash my mouth seven times over. And then later during Physics tutorial, when I got one of the physics questions wrong and I announced the answer thinking it was correct, Gia was the FIRST (yes, FUCKING FIRST) to turn to me and made this weird hacking sound with his eyes bugged out, which we all assumed to be laughter.

(From hereon it becomes something like the now-defunct BITCH Files.)

I honestly, honestly believe Gia is a proper human being. I really doubt his retardation, especially since his GPA is quite high. But frankly speaking, I COMPLETELY SEE NO CAUSE FOR HIS ACTING (and I believe he is acting). Earlier in the day, already Mdm Lim scolded him during PW for his stupid mumbling to himself when he is supposed to be presenting.

He was mumbling. Not speaking in an accent, which is different, but purposely bending his head low and speaking to an ant on his hand.

To quote John Paul, “It’s not funny.”

He has freaked Kevyna out during joint-PE, also because of his retarded overenthusiasm until he oversteps the personal boundary and physical contacts others. He has annoyed me, particularly, to no end because honestly, even if you would want to act like an idiot for the good part of your schooling life (to fool others into underestimating you), why would you want to act it until OTHERS find you a complete and stupid brainless git?! As an actor myself I find it completely senseless.

Audrey and I were sitting behind him during Econs tutorial, and we had never smelled a scent (stench) like it before. Oily, and foul, and so unbelievably gross. It was sickening.

Isn’t it for personal good and hygiene and cleanliness that YOU BATHE CONSTANTLY?

I mean, come on, for the first part, one might find it interesting (in a Ripley’s-BION way) that he only bathes once a week, but it gets stale fast, and it stinks (literally). Plus you won’t believe the amount of dandruff he collects ON his head (literally too). You would think that someone who is a scholar would have a decent level of independence and self-respect that you wouldn’t degrade yourself to THIS level.

I mean, you could be a joker, you could be a cold, heartless bitch, you could be a full-out mugger and overachiever, but at the very least you don’t overstep others’ personal space and you bathe and you do things PROPERLY.

The more I type, the more worked-up I am. It’s utterly unbelievable. I still can’t believe he’s in my class. If it wasn’t for Leonard, Shi Hui, James, Ru Yun, Wan Lin, Kevyna, Rita, Michelle, Zhixin, Rui Yong and all the other decent people in my class I would have just switched off, regardless of my combination. It’s just so much to have to deal with him, especially when I am extremely certain he is just playing a role. Trying to be unique, maybe?

Moving on.

2. I was late today. I can’t believe how utterly ineffective the roads outside RJC are.

For all that we pay the school, or at least for taxes to the Government (capital G please, it’s all the rage nowadays) they couldn’t even create some sort of alleviation to the traffic congestion that has been around for SO DAMN LONG?

I don’t know if I got white slip or not, but Chinks told me lateness is just a warning or something. White slips have to be issued by teachers physically or something.

3. I really disappointed myself and KQ and John Paul and Zhenxiao today. Even with all of KQ’s pep talk and Zhenxiao’s annoying but super helpful (really!) encouragements I still didn’t manage to finish off the Sprint-Jog sets properly.

Running’s a bitch (it’s my worst component) so I was quite furious with myself. Have you ever been mad at yourself? It’s not a good feeling. Today, for me, was just so tiring and so, so bad (though it could have been worse).

4. I just thought of something quite scary/weird.

What if one day, Gia were to come into school with two guns (highly unlikely) and start firing off into LT2 during that boring Thermophysics lecture?

And he would go all emo, and complain, “Oh, you rich bitches, you evil, bullying creatures who don’t have hearts, so you deserve to die, etc etc.” And he’ll probably send a tape to Mediacorp before blowing his own brains out.

Then I would say, “You bring it upon yourself. You act that way, you be all antisocial, and low-EQ, and completely deranged and distant from everyone else, that if we treat you the way we treat you now, it’s because you deserve it.”

And I think it’s the same case with the Virginia Tech case and other shootings in the US. These complete losers spend everyday being antisocial, being all weird, not bathing and probably indulging in weird acts like putting magnifying glasses on ants and watching them burn.

Can you blame others for making fun of them? For the hierachy in how social orders work, and for how others treat them?

Don’t come making some shit about how you’re being treated unfairly, etc etc.

Cho Seung Hui should have seen that treatment coming, from the way he was writing sick poems in his Literature class.

What I’m trying to say is, YOU BROUGHT IT UPON YOURSELF. Don’t go shooting other people or blaming others for what you have done to yourself. And this is not just to Gia.

This is to all low-level losers who think they can bring guns into class and let loose because “My life sucks”.

I don’t practise Maths consistently, so my Maths sucks.

Consequences come with everything, and now that we’re in JC, we have to learn to bear them.

It’s a phase of growing up. And if you can’t deal with that, well then, sorry, go jump off a building or something, instead of taking it out on people who are truly innocent.

Those are consequences, baby. Bear with them.

Feb. 14, 2008
A gunman walks into a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, killing five and injuring 16 before turning the gun on himself.

April 16, 2007
Seung-Hui Cho kills 32 people in a dorm and a classroom building at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va. He then turns the gun on himself.

___

Well, Jane Hambleton, the self professed “meanest mom” has made it past ‘fark fame’ into the realm of ‘national smellebrity’ with her appearance on GMA.  Apparently they’re going to have to change the title of the show to Good Morning America as well as some parts of Scenic Canada; damn that woman is large.  Did she place the advertisement in the newspaper or wear it on her massive back?  It’s not that they don’t make sandwich boards in her size, it’s that she ate it.   I’m going to go out on a limb here and either assume she adopted this young man (if I were him, I’d drink too), or she ate the Chinese delivery man and was forced to legally raise his young.  I guess we’ll never know, because I guess it’s racist to ask.  What a fascinating interview, lady.

It looks like somebody went to Glamour Shots out at the mall.  Probably in between trips to the food court.  Personally, I don’t think it’s very smart to provoke the Chinaman.  We all remember how the last one turned out.